'Now's the Time to Get LODA Reform Over the Finish Line'

The Experimental Aircraft Association announced its support for possible reform and expansion of the FAA's Letter of Deviation Authority (LODA). 

The changes desired by the EAA would allow more instructors to provide transition training in experimental aircraft while being compensated for use of the aircraft. The EAA's latest efforts focus on traditional LODAs used for compensated flight training, in line with the original intent of the system. It has gained some popularity over the last decade, allowing instructors across the country to offer flight training in various types of experimental aircraft. The EAA's preferred expansion to the program would make transition training more viable by bolstering a lesser-known portion of the LODA program that allows primary training for ultralights and light sport aircraft.

The LODA system, in this sense, was a sort of legislative sidestep that allowed the FAA to provide "quick relief to those operators affected by the district court ruling in Warbird Adventures v FAA." That case, the EAA says, "disrupted the ability of experimental, limited, and primary category aircraft operators to hire instructors to train in the operator’s own aircraft." The EAA has assisted experimental aircraft owners and instructors as they navigate their way through the system by walking them through the LODA process to fix the issue. The EAA also holds an exemption that covers owners of limited category aircraft.

The Association has stressed that while they are pursing legislative solutions to the issue, the FAA has assured them that it is hard at work on a fast rulemaking fix (which, while fast-tracked, is still limited to the speed of bureaucracy).

A policy expansion and advisory circular were released in 2015, with an updated rulemaking fix patching up legal shortcomings put out for public comment in 2018. Since then, though, the EAA says that it has been continually delayed in the years since. They believe that recent attention on the Warbird Adventures case presents a prime opportunity to capitalize on, saying that the focus on LODA utility "may help finally nudge these reforms across the finish line."

The EAA approached the General Aviation Joint Safety Committee at its recent quarterly meeting, who agreed to highlight the issue until a lasting solution is found. 

FMI: www.eaa.org